“This government bill, which was intended to address an emergency situation facing our farmers, has — since the Senate’s amendments — significantly altered the policy governing the allocation of water resources in our country,” she said.

Annie Genevard, France’s conservative agriculture minister, directly opposed her colleague at the Ministry of Ecological Transition, warning that “allowing this bill to fail — whether out of ideology, self-interest or fear — would push farmers to the brink of despair,” in an interview with another Sunday publication, Le Journal du Dimanche.

Balancing farming and the environment

The debate over the legislation has highlighted the tensions between calls to protect the environment and efforts to keep French agriculture economically viable.

It has also exposed serious rifts among Macron’s centrists, most notably between Lecornu and Gabriel Attal, the head of Macron’s centrist Renaissance party and a candidate in next year’s presidential election in France.

Attal and Lecornu both supported reintroducing the pesticide in question, acetamiprid, under exceptional circumstances, but in a parliamentary debate Monday night the centrist lawmaker nonetheless expressed frustration that the government allowed the provision to be introduced at such a late stage.

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“We are still seeing that over half of the EU’s energy consumption is made by imported fossil fuels,” an EU official told journalists during a technical briefing on Thursday, pointing to the bloc’s vulnerability to global energy shocks. Since the escalation of the Middle East conflict, the EU has spent more than €50 billion extra on fossil fuel imports, the official added.

The plan targets industry, transport and buildings, with the latter accounting for around half of EU gas consumption. It introduces new measures to accelerate heat pump deployment, expand charging infrastructure for electric vehicles and support industrial electrification.

The electrification push comes as the Commission warns that progress has stalled despite rapid growth in clean power generation. More than 70 percent of EU electricity generation now comes from clean sources, mainly renewables and nuclear, but the electrification rate has remained stuck at around 23 percent over the past decade.

The plan focuses on five main barriers identified by the Commission: the gap between electricity and gas prices, access to infrastructure, innovation and the upfront cost of electrification technologies such as heat pumps and electric vehicles.

A central element are the efforts to reduce the electricity-to-gas price gap, with electricity currently costing up to 2.5 times more than gas on average, according to the Commission.

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Under the Commission’s review, the LRF will be reduced from 4.4 percent to 3.7 percent between 2031 and 2035. After 2036, it will decrease at the even gentler rate of 1.7 percent annually. That will extend pollution well into the 2040s, and will likely be seen as a major rollback by the ETS’s staunchest defenders.

The Commission will also hand out free carbon allowances for several years longer, including to sectors covered by the carbon border tax, which will now receive them until 2038 — a move that could inspire challenges at the World Trade Organization.

For the first time, starting in 2036, the Commission will give industry the option of buying carbon credits from outside the EU to offset their emissions. That has the potential to lower the carbon price and give industries more options to pollute if EU carbon allowances run out. It will also introduce 250 million tons of domestic removal credits — representing carbon dioxide removed from the atmosphere — into the ETS to be auctioned between 2031 and 2040.

Taken together, these measures will likely be welcomed by industry, that claim the ETS in its current trajectory is unrealistic and costly. Whether pro-ETS groups in Parliament and member countries accept the looser rules is less certain.

EU climate chief Wopke Hoekstra said the review was a more “business-friendly” approach to carbon pricing, but insisted the EU had not abandoned climate goals.

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Just days ago, a similar group of 10 doubled down and issued a new letter to von der Leyen and pressured the Commission to weaken the ETS, in a clear sign they’re willing to be a blocking minority in the Council if new ETS legislation doesn’t satisfy them.

Polish Secretary of State Krzysztof Bolesta told POLITICO the letter shows the 10 countries are prepared for constructive ETS debates, but also described it as a “gentle reminder” that there is a “significant group whose weight cannot be ignored.” He added: “The bazooka is there in case we might need it at some stage.”

But the big question is where France and Germany fall on the issues. The two giants of the EU have previously avoided publicly denigrating the ETS, but the ongoing uncertainty around the Strait of Hormuz and U.S. tariffs have led them to quietly lean closer to the “dirties,” as one EU diplomat, granted anonymity to speak openly like others in this article, referred to the gang of 10.

“I think it’s more the French working and the Germans supporting them, than the other way around,” the diplomat claimed. “The French are much more active, and the Germans are following them […] But I think nobody now and nobody in the near future is questioning the ETS as a system as such… [needs] fine tuning.”

On the other side is a seven-country alliance of ETS-purists, led by Spain, Sweden and the Netherlands, who jointly published a letter demanding the Commission resists meddling with the current legislation and hold the course on the linear reduction factor. In perhaps a bad sign for the defenders of the ETS, three people familiar with that letter told POLITICO Germany pulled out from signing it at the last minute.

The post EU sets up biggest climate fight of 2026 by slamming brakes on carbon market appeared first on EURIntel.

The electrification plan, meanwhile, will seek to tackle one of the greatest bottlenecks in the bloc’s energy transition — the switch from technologies that burn fossil fuels, such as combustion engines and gas boilers, to those that run directly on power, such as electric cars and heat pumps.

For both proposals, the Commission will lean heavily on the narrative that slashing fossil fuel use is good for the EU’s economy, reducing the bloc’s exposure to volatile import prices and driving domestic investments.

Climate, in rhetorical terms, is an afterthought: In a leaked draft of the electrification plan, the emissions impact was mentioned only once.

But how ambitious the two proposals are will determine whether the EU executive can keep the pollution-slashing promises it insists on remaining committed to despite the economic and political headwinds.

Only two days before its Friday announcements, the Commission held an event to commemorate the victims of climate disasters, coinciding with the fifth anniversary of the deadly floods that killed nearly 250 people in Germany, Belgium and neighboring countries.

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In the run-up to the Turnberry deal, Brussels gauged the intentions of leading European businesses and “urgently” requested they provide data about their ongoing and planned investments in the U.S. The $600 billion figure was based on those estimates, but was never intended as a binding commitment.

The same applies to the $750 billion energy pledge. Commission officials have admitted the figure reflects the bloc’s projected “needs,” not a procurement plan by the EU executive or member countries. Moreover, with energy prices so volatile, it’s hard to target a fixed price.

To be sure, EU energy imports from the U.S. are increasing. Over the past year, the bloc has significantly upped its purchases of U.S. LNG as it sought to extinguish its energy trade with Russia.

The war in Iran has added further momentum: Between January and April the EU bought $15 billion in oil and gas products from the U.S., up 24 percent from the previous four months according to EU trade data.

But that’s still far short of the headline figure pledged over three years. Getting to $750 billion, at that rate, would take 16 years — not three.

The post All the trade promises the EU and the US never meant to keep appeared first on EURIntel.

Another option under discussion is introducing offsets — in the form of carbon removal certificates and/or international carbon credits.

Removal certificates would represent one ton of CO2 taken out of the atmosphere through carbon capture technology, while foreign carbon credits account for emissions reduced outside the EU. Integrating either or both in the ETS would give companies more options to cover their pollution as the cap on domestic emissions allowances tightens.

What to watch for: Whether the Commission will tinker with the MSR, whether it will open the door to international carbon credits in the ETS, and how carbon removals will be added into the market. Removals are less controversial, as their addition would also incentivize investment in much-needed carbon capture tech, but foreign credits — which depressed the ETS price when they were traded in the 2010s — are highly contentious.

4. Polluting for free

The manufacturing sector, and some power plants, currently receive a certain share of pollution permits for free to reduce the cost burden and protect them from being outcompeted by foreign firms not subject to carbon pricing. Compliance with sector-specific performance benchmarks determines how many freebies a factory gets.

Sectors covered by the EU’s new carbon border tax — steel, cement, aluminum, fertilizers, hydrogen and electricity — will see their free allowances phased out until 2034. That’s to ensure the EU remains compliant with World Trade Organization subsidy rules.

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“We considered it essential to revise legislation that is more than 30 years old and adapt it to an environmental and hunting context that has changed considerably,” Senate Agriculture Committee Chair Luca De Carlo told POLITICO, rejecting suggestions the reform was politically driven.

The bill is “not aimed at the conservative electorate” but at protecting wildlife through better management, argued the lawmaker from Meloni’s Brothers of Italy party.

Environmental groups disagree. Animal and environmental rights activists have been protesting the reform — which has been dubbed the sparatutto (“shoot everything”) act by the opposition — in Naples this week. Meanwhile, Green Europe leader Angelo Bonelli accused Meloni of trying to “chase a few votes from the hunting community.”

Though the reform has been under discussion for months, its passage comes as Meloni is starting to see a significant challenge to her right. In this more competitive field, hunting has become part of a broader constellation of issues — along with firearms, migration and rural identity — that increasingly serve as markers for a wider conservative electorate that the PM can no longer take for granted.

Vannacci has already appeared at public meetings with hunting associations to argue that hunting is not merely a pastime but flows from a duty to manage and discipline nature. A former paratrooper and army general, he has been a natural draw for hunters and gun owners.

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The smart glasses still face fierce privacy pushback, regardless of the change in batteries rules.

Cláudio Texeira, the head of digital policy at Europe’s largest consumer protection group BEUC, said: “Europe should not dilute consumer protections. Smart glasses are already raising important concerns about privacy, security and consumer choice. Exemptions from EU battery removability rules should remain exactly that: genuine exceptions based on clear technical and safety evidence, not industry pressure. Exempting these devices … risks setting a dangerous precedent.”

When Meta launched the first iteration of its RayBan smart glasses in Europe in 2021, the product immediately sparked concerns with Irish and Italian privacy watchdogs over whether the specs made it obvious enough to people that they are being filmed.

And earlier this year, concerns peaked again when Swedish media reported that subcontractors for Meta in Kenya were reviewing “deeply private” footage captured by the firm’s smart glasses to help annotate the content to train artificial intelligence models. It included recordings of people’s bathroom visits, banking details, or even them having sex.

The European Data Protection Board, which gathers privacy regulators across Europe, has ordered a report into smart glasses which should be finalized this summer, chair Anu Talus told POLITICO earlier. She added that the board will look at actions from there.

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A separate dataset published Monday by EuroMOMO, a mortality monitoring service supported by the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control and the World Health Organization, showed that its 27 member countries reported 10,650 excess deaths between June 22 and June 28. Those figures could still change as more data trickles in.

Excess deaths represent the increase in mortality compared to average levels. Although the figures capture fatalities from all causes, this measure is used to swiftly assess the toll of heat waves; getting a precise count of heat-related deaths is painstaking work, as high temperatures kill not only through heat stroke, but also by exacerbating existing conditions.

“It’s very plausible that these figures are primarily related to heat,” said Lasse Skafte Vestergaard, chief physician at Denmark’s Statens Serum Institut, which hosts EuroMOMO, of the service’s findings.

“There are no other obvious explanations or public health threats currently in Europe that could explain this,” he told POLITICO. “And the figures are really quite unusual in terms of the magnitude.”

EuroMOMO’s figures do not include a country-level breakdown, though the service noted that excess deaths were particularly high in France and Belgium in late June.

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Grudler, who chairs a cross-party group of pro-nuclear lawmakers in the European Parliament, concurred.

“It is certain that climate change is taken into account in deciding the location of new plants. If you invest €13 billion in a site and it becomes obsolete the very next day because there isn’t enough water to cool the core, the investment is not right,” he said.

Former energy minister Agnès Pannier-Runacher, who helped draw up Macron’s nuclear energy policy during his second term, is confident that the government can find a sufficient number of sites for new nuclear plants, even if “it won’t happen in the blink of an eye.”

“Nuclear power plants have been designed with an overemphasis on safety and security. They are in fact much more robust […] than many other facilities in our energy system,” she said, citing concerns over the electric grid.

“Of course, it needs to be factored into the to-do list, but it isn’t a challenge that stands out on the critical path of nuclear power plant construction,” said Pannier-Runacher.

Elisa Bertholomey contributed to this report.

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Ten of Europe’s largest economies — including Poland, Italy, Czechia and Austria — are publicly campaigning for the policy to be gutted, arguing it harms industry and drives up bills.

However, according to Rosencrantz, “a weaker ETS would be bad for the climate and bad for Europe’s competitiveness. Companies that have invested billions in the green transition should not be undercut because others want to lower the bar.”

Ireland, which took over the EU’s agenda as part of its six-month rotating presidency of the Council of the EU at the beginning of June, will now have to negotiate a compromise on the file.

According to a letter obtained by POLITICO, Sweden has written to Ireland’s Europe Minister urging him to ensure “predictability” by maintaining the current ETS rules, including waste incineration in the framework, and bringing ships of above 400 gross tons into the scheme.

Spain, Finland, the Netherlands, Portugal, Luxembourg and Sweden have all signed up to a joint campaign with Finland to protect the ETS in its current version.

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Erin Borror, vice president of economic analysis for the U.S. Meat Export Federation, echoed these concerns, warning that the deforestation regime was “very problematic” for suppliers serving the EU market, as well as the EU beef industry, importers and customers, who face “unnecessarily higher costs and regulatory burdens.”

The federation hopes the U.K. “will not go down the same path,” Borror said, arguing that similar rules would make Britain “a more difficult market to serve” without delivering tangible benefits for reducing global deforestation or for British consumers.

If the U.K. proceeds, she urged policymakers to include a “true negligible-risk category” that would remove low-risk suppliers from the most burdensome requirements.

The American Forest & Paper Association also warned the U.K. against replicating what it sees as the EU’s shortcomings. While supporting efforts to tackle deforestation, the group cautioned against a “one-size-fits-all” approach, arguing that “costly geolocation and traceability requirements” could become “non-tariff trade barriers” when they do not reflect low-risk supply chains.

Another ‘axe to grind’

Allie Renison, a former U.K. government trade adviser, now a director at SEC Newgate, said Britain will likely try to learn from the EU’s experience and design a “less problematic” system — particularly around which products are covered and how rules are enforced.

But she warned that the broader direction of travel could still create friction with Washington. With the U.S. administration increasingly focused on regulation as a trade barrier, following the EU’s approach “on principle” means Washington “may feel it has more of a substantive axe to grind.”

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Disruption in the Strait of Hormuz has sent shockwaves through energy markets. In Europe, natural gas prices are up almost 50 percent from the end of February, while storage sites are expected to refill to just 76 percent of capacity by October — their lowest level since 2011 heading into winter.

Meanwhile, increased AI use puts pressure on the energy grid; electricity consumption from European data centers is expected to increase by 49-187 percent to 2030. We must therefore avoid the perverse incentives of ‘tokenmaxxing’ and, rather, take a more frugal approach that seeks to maximize the tokens per kWh. Using ‘right-sized’ AI models that might be smaller or industry-specific, employing smarter infrastructure and decarbonizing data centers can help.

Speed is the new currency

The pace of change is undoubtedly a challenge. From conversations with CEOs across different industries, I know many feel overwhelmed with the pace of change. But this is not business as usual anymore; this is the moment to accelerate business transformation.

The good news is that, with clean data and a well-defined use case, the time it takes to move from AI pilot to scaled solution is compressing. Across industries, our clients see the return on investment crystallizing: financial crime and ‘know your customer’ in banking; autonomous supply chains and demand forecasting in consumer goods; digital twins and predictive maintenance in automotive; and citizen services and contact centers in public services.

Indeed, such is the momentum that I am more confident about European competitiveness today than I was a year ago — even in the difficult macroeconomic context — because the conversation has changed. Twelve months ago, many organizations were still trying to understand the potential of AI. Today, the focus is on how to implement it in a way that both captures value and strengthens Europe’s position.

As AI continues to accelerate, Europe’s competitiveness hinges ever more on the speed of execution.

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Critics are alarmed that these new guidelines will effectively cut out heavy industry and big infrastructure projects from EU funds over environmental concerns — potentially leading to job losses and deindustrialization.

In a set of guidelines approved on Monday to complement its budget proposal, the Commission exempted spending on defense, security and crises — including support to regions bordering Russia — from the DNSH principle in order to soothe national capitals, which had first proposed the carve-outs.

In its draft guidelines, seen by POLITICO, the Commission also suggested exempting projects judged to be “overriding public interest,” potentially opening the door for data centers or critical raw materials to benefit from favorable treatment.

But that’s not enough for Italy, which intends to further undermine the rules during negotiations, said an EU diplomat with knowledge of the discussions, granted anonymity to speak freely. In a sign of discontent, last month Rome abstained in a vote on the broader text that includes the DNSH principle, said the three diplomats.

This sets up tensions between Italy — a long-standing critic of EU green rules — and a rival bloc of Nordic countries like Denmark and Finland, which are pushing in the opposite direction.

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Critics are alarmed that these new guidelines will effectively cut out heavy industry and big infrastructure projects from EU funds over environmental concerns — potentially leading to job losses and deindustrialization.

In a set of guidelines approved on Monday to complement its budget proposal, the Commission exempted spending on defense, security and crises — including support to regions bordering Russia — from the DNSH principle in order to soothe national capitals, which had first proposed the carve-outs.

In its draft guidelines, seen by POLITICO, the Commission also suggested exempting projects judged to be “overriding public interest,” potentially opening the door for data centers or critical raw materials to benefit from favorable treatment.

But that’s not enough for Italy, which intends to further undermine the rules during negotiations, said an EU diplomat with knowledge of the discussions, granted anonymity to speak freely. In a sign of discontent, last month Rome abstained in a vote on the broader text that includes the DNSH principle, said the three diplomats.

This sets up tensions between Italy — a long-standing critic of EU green rules — and a rival bloc of Nordic countries like Denmark and Finland, which are pushing in the opposite direction.

The post Italy leads push to weaken green rules in €2 trillion EU budget appeared first on EURIntel.

The U.S. oil and gas industry has succeeded in exporting massive amounts of natural gas to Europe. Now, with the help of White House officials, it looks like it might also succeed in exporting the Trump administration’s deregulatory agenda.

Now the sector is attempting to strong-arm the European Commission, the EU’s executive arm, into delaying the rollout of what the bloc intended to be a major rule to curb a potent climate pollution. It has prevailed in winning the backing of over half the bloc’s 27 member countries, who have joined U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright in calling for swift changes to the rules.

At stake is potentially billions of dollars in natural gas that U.S. companies want to continue exporting to Europe but that EU policymakers say must be subject to strict rules governing emissions of methane, a harmful greenhouse gas that has fueled extreme weather around the globe. And it raises worries among climate advocates that the Americans are choking out what the EU intended to be a major initiative to combat climate change, one that had been years in the making.

The energy industry’s monthslong campaign against new methane regulations that had been in the works since 2024 scored a major victory last week when member countries pushed the commission to delay and make complying with the rules easier. The regulation would require oil and gas imports into the EU to show their fuel is produced with little methane.

“The underlying policy is still very flawed,” Mike Sommers, the chief executive of API, told reporters in response to a question from POLITICO, saying the group has sent delegations to Europe and is working with the Trump administration to “hopefully get a policy that makes sense for American producers — and, by the way, for Europe.”

Many of the industry’s arguments center on technical challenges about implementing the regulation. But one oil and gas executive was more blunt, saying there’s also a battle of business philosophies.

“Some people view this more ideologically about whether or not Europe should be regulating global oil and gas production, but then there are others who see the realities that the EU has over-stretched without the necessary frameworks in place, in the EU and globally — whether around measurement, clarity of enforcement, or understanding of existing commercial agreements.”

The diplomatic fight is around an EU regulation aimed at cutting industrial releases of methane. The greenhouse gas has 80 times the warming power of carbon dioxide — and is also the main ingredient for natural gas, something European countries have come to depend on the United States for as a supplier. The bloc has committed to ending imports of Russian fuel by the beginning of next year and must also find substitutes for Qatari supplies halted due to damage from Iranian strikes earlier this year.

EU officials proposed that companies seeking to sell natural gas into Europe disclose how much methane leaked out of the wells, inventory tanks, pipelines and ships on its way to Europe. The rules are designed to both meet the bloc’s energy needs while limiting its effects on warming the planet. It would require importers to verify that the fuel they receive is produced with limited methane leakage and intensity.

American oil and gas producers say providing that level of detail once the new rule would go into effect Jan. 1 is all but impossible and would effectively shut them out of a major market. They warn the EU devised the rule without a full understanding of the U.S. gas market, where companies mix supply from various fields and basins to chill into a liquid and then export.

“There is absolutely no way that an importer in Europe could say, ‘show me who produced this gas in the United States, and what was their methane intensity,’” said Fred Hutchison, president of LNG Allies, which supports U.S. LNG exports.

At least two senior European officials expressed skepticism at the industry narrative.

Finnish energy minister Sari Multala told POLITICO that Helsinki’s assessment of the supply risks didn’t match up to the dramatic conclusions reached by other member countries pushing to revise the regulation. Finland doesn’t “see the point” of reopening the rules, she said.

Spanish energy minister Sara Aagesen Muñoz went one further, vowing to fight to preserve the rules. “There are other elements that the Commission should explore, but not opening the regulation,” she said. “This is something that was very tough [on emissions], and it’s very important.”

Exxon Mobil and some of the U.S. industry’s largest players have publicly vowed to combat methane emissions, saying it’s in their interest to account for the gas being lost to leaks and flaring. Lobbying outfits like API have also consistently noted U.S. gas burns cleaner than its competitors.

Still, they uniformly have pushed back against the EU rule. Companies contend their concern is about regulatory uncertainty and timelines rather than any ideological objection to slashing methane emissions.

“Importers will be forced to break the law or stop delivering energy to Europe. No amount of guidance or waivers will fix that,” a spokesperson for Exxon Mobil said in a statement. “The EU must hit the pause button now and simplify the rules so industry can continue to reduce emissions while also delivering the energy that allows society to thrive.”

An industry-backed study — one that many EU officials dispute — shows that uncertainty over how to comply with the EU rules, if finalized, would jeopardize 43 percent of the bloc’s gas and 87 percent of its crude oil imports, much of it from the United States.

That stance may also be masking an ideological aversion to overseas regulation that dictates actions within U.S. borders.

“Some folks are fearful of creep,” said William Foiles, CEO of Project Canary, a company that works with oil and gas operators to reduce methane emissions.

Not all in the oil industry have cast the regulation as doomsday for natural gas sellers. Olav Aamlid Syversen, the vice president of public affairs at Norwegian oil major Equinor, told POLITICO that it would be better to adopt a wait-and-see approach, reviewing the impact of the rules in 2028 instead of adding to the legal uncertainty by delaying them outright. That would give EU authorities the time to gather “the necessary evidence” to judge whether changes need to be made, he said.

He was confident that Equinor itself — which has invested heavily in reducing methane emissions — faced only limited risks to its European exports. “We are pretty confident that the gas from Norway will make it across the border,” Syversen said.

But other global oil and gas companies made the case to Brussels to slow things down, said another executive with a major U.S. oil and gas producer, who was granted anonymity to discuss private deliberations.

Industry lobbied EU officials to delay the rules until policymakers determine how to implement them in a way that would make compliance easier for U.S. companies. For help, it recently turned to the Trump administration to amplify pressure.

“It’s only when we couldn’t make any progress there that we turned more towards the administration to say, ‘Can you help us?’” the U.S. executive for a major oil and gas producer said.

The White House was happy to answer the call.

Energy Secretary Wright — a former chief executive of an oil services company — penned an open letter along with the energy chiefs of Qatar and other exporters, backing industry’s warning that if the rules are implemented Europe could face a severe shortage of oil and gas. Wright urged the EU to delay its rule, aligned with a snowballing of opposition that eventually rolled up powerful political backing in Europe.

Austrian State Secretary for Energy Elisabeth Zehetner told POLITICO that Vienna started to worry about the impact of the methane rules after U.S. diplomats warned her directly of the potential supply risks. U.S. officials had “several meetings with us explaining the situation,” she said on the sidelines of the Luxembourg summit. Her office declined to say when the meetings were or which U.S. embassy the diplomats belonged to. Saudi and Qatari officials also told her government that their energy sectors would struggle to comply with the rules, she added.

Zehetner added that even if the dire supply warnings are overhyped, it makes sense to err on the side of caution, given Europe’s dwindling sources of supply following the destruction of energy infrastructure in the Persian Gulf and the adoption of the EU’s stepwise ban on Russian gas.

“If you look at the current numbers concerning how much LNG we are getting from the U.S. — and also because we tried to phase out from Russian gas — our responsibility as politicians is to be aware that there could rise up a next problem,” Zehetner said.

The lobbying had its effect. At a summit of EU energy ministers last month in Luxembourg, 17 member countries, including Germany, argued to delay the rules under the EU’s current mantra of “competitiveness,” following a push by the populist, fossil-fuel-dependent governments of Czechia and Slovakia.

The Department of Energy celebrated the victory.

“We are encouraged by the growing momentum across Europe and among the world’s leading energy exporters in support of a legislative fix to the EU Methane Regulation,” a spokesperson told POLITICO in a statement. “There is now a broad and expanding consensus among EU Member States, Parliament, European industry, international energy companies, and major supplier nations that the regulation will lead to higher prices and serious oil and gas supply disruptions.”

Still, divisions linger over how that can be achieved, given the timeline for implementing the regulation is already enshrined in EU law. Some of the countries at last month’s meeting adopted a cautious stance, acknowledging that opening up the regulation for changes — at a time when far-right lawmakers have increasing sway over the legislative process — could lead to fresh uncertainty and unintended consequences.

“There are legal risks in reopening the legislation, absolutely, but there are also legal risks in doing nothing if companies don’t know what rules they’ll face — we need a pragmatic solution,” Ebba Busch, energy minister of typically pro-green Sweden, told POLITICO.

James Bikales contributed to this report.

The post ‘Can you help us?’: US oil execs turn to Trump to topple Europe’s climate rules appeared first on EURIntel.

Methane traps far more heat than carbon dioxide but disappears within a decade, while CO2 lingers for centuries. Livestock lobbyists argue that a steady herd adds little new warming, and that the usual way of counting overstates its impact. Ireland and New Zealand, two dairy and beef powerhouses, have pushed the case in international fora.

The strategy leans their way. Its answer to methane is not a target but a measurement project: emissions counted at farm level in enough detail to reward the farmer who switches feed additives or breeds lower-emitting cattle. The strategy talks of the “biogenic” nature of livestock methane, the idea that gas from a cow’s gut is part of a natural carbon cycle rather than a fossil-fuel emission, which is the lobbyists’ argument. Officials insist this is accuracy, not an accounting trick.

But green groups disagree, and more than 30, including Greenpeace and the European Environmental Bureau, wrote to Hansen last month against approaches that “downplay” livestock’s impact, citing scientists who say methane heats the planet equally whether it comes from a cow or a pipeline.

Marco Contiero, Greenpeace’s EU agriculture policy director, said the Commission looks set to embrace the same accounting favored by Ireland and New Zealand, branding methane from farmed animals as natural to avoid the deep cuts the sector has long resisted. He cast “this kind of wishful thinking” from the Commission as “a scandal.”

Paying, not policing

The strategy assumes the sector’s decline can be reversed, and its footprint cut, entirely through incentives and technological fixes.

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Brazil denied the existence of any such steel understanding. “To date, there has been no agreement between Brazil and the EU regarding compensation,” its ministries of foreign affairs and trade said in a strongly-worded statement on Wednesday night.

In a comment after this article was published, the Commission said it had engaged constructively with Brazil over the past four months and negotiations would continue.

“Discussions to date have clearly demonstrated a shared commitment to finding a mutually acceptable solution,” a Commission spokesperson said. “We are working towards finalizing an agreement with a trusted partner like Brazil.”

Before Brazil spoke out, a senior EU official had said on Tuesday that the secretive quota negotiations held at World Trade Organization headquarters in Geneva had not been easy.

“We are serving a smaller pie and therefore, inevitably, the pieces that we’re cutting on both sides will be smaller for each country,” said the official, who briefed reporters on condition of anonymity.

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With Hungary’s Viktor Orbán no longer a thorn in the EU’s side, the expectations are high for progress on multiple fronts. But there’s also a looming deadline. Mindful of the French presidential election coming in mid-2027, in which the far-right National Rally currently leads the polls, politicians are eager to wrap up discussions on policy files large and small by the end of the year.

It means there’s a lot to do.

The biggest task is the EU’s next long-term budget, which will determine the bloc’s financial firepower from 2028 to 2034. But the list is long, encompassing everything from enlargement to tech sovereignty, innovative medicines and tweaks to the bloc’s flagship climate law.

Here’s POLITICO’s guide to the some of the main items that will keep Ireland busy.

Agreeing a 7-year budget

Why it matters: The EU budget, known as the Multiannual Financial Framework, governs the bloc’s central spending on everything from agricultural subsidies to defense projects. It is one of the toughest nuts to crack in the Brussels machine because it is approved by unanimity and involves meshing the conflicting priorities of 27 governments.

State of play: Dublin is set to chair budget discussions among EU governments and circulate a new negotiating document with revised spending figures in October. That will pave the way for the final furlong of the negotiations, which will be handled by the President of the European Council António Costa. His goal is to secure a deal among leaders in a December summit.

Fault lines: Wealthy Northern European countries backing a radically smaller budget criticized Cyprus’ negotiating document from last week that proposed a mere 2 percent cut from the European Commission proposal. On the other hand, Southern and Eastern European countries welcomed Nicosia’s changes. Ireland faces the sensitive task of restoring a good balance for both camps that can pave the way for a deal. Good luck with that.

Likely progress:

— Gregorio Sorgi

Preventing deindustrialization

Why it matters: Europe’s industry is under pressure from a wave of subsidized Chinese exports, high energy prices and a perceived competitiveness lag vis-à-vis the U.S. and China. The Industrial Accelerator Act is the bloc’s attempt to prevent deindustrialization, and is Executive Vice President Stéphane Séjourné’s baby. It introduces a “Made in EU” preference for public procurement in strategic sectors as well as conditions on foreign direct investment to curb Chinese acquisitions of strategic assets.

State of play: EU leaders would like the proposal, unveiled in March, to be ready by the end of the year. Ireland is not shying away from the challenge. “It is a very aggressive roadmap, there is no doubt of that, but in Ireland we are very strong in getting compromises,” Enterprise Minister Peter Burke told POLITICO.

Fault lines: Drawing up a list of “trusted partners” — countries that would enjoy the same status as EU members in public procurement — is the biggest challenge of the IAA. The “Made in EU” concept has met resistance from the Nordic, free trade members of the bloc and export-heavy Germany, while Séjourné’s home country, France, leads the enthusiasts. The file is also the target of intense lobbying by industry sectors, with automotive split between suppliers (who support the act) and manufacturers (who mostly don’t). Last but not least, the proposal will be handled not by one, but three co-lead negotiators at the European Parliament.

Likely progress:

— Francesca Micheletti

Increasing homegrown tech

Why it matters: After multiple delays, the European Commission finally unveiled its plan to crack down on the bloc’s dependence on foreign tech — a push driven largely by fears that Europe’s overreliance on U.S. firms could be weaponized by Donald Trump. The so-called tech sovereignty package includes the Cloud and AI Development Act — an effort to boost European champions accompanied by new obligations for public sectors to assess vulnerabilities and replace U.S. providers where necessary — as well as a revision of the Chips Act aimed at doubling down on both the production of AI chips and demand for advanced semiconductors.

State of play: EU digital ministers gave the proposals an early, warm reception, but they are still digesting regulations that are heavy on fine print and leave a lot to future secondary legislation and budget. Still, the package marks the first major signal that Europe is confronting its digital dependencies on foreign countries head-on in a new, geopolitically charged context.

Fault lines: The proposals are expected to face heavy lobbying, including from the U.S. administration and industry, which stands to lose the most. The laws will only be as powerful as their enforcement with much discretion being left to EU capitals on the most sensitive issues, although the Commission would gain some powers to overrule them — a provision that could be struck down during negotiations.

Likely progress:

— Mathieu Pollet

Restricting social media use

Why it matters: Restricting the age of social media users is one of the biggest changes in internet regulation in decades, reminiscent of the 1990s crackdown on tobacco companies for creating addictive products. Globally, the tone around social media use for kids has drastically changed, with Australia introducing the first age restrictions in December 2025. Other countries are following suit, including Denmark, France and Greece. The European Commission is looking at similar measures, in part due to pressure from national governments.

State of play: The Commission has tasked a panel of experts with coming up with a recommendation this summer, led by two co-chairs, Maria Melchior and Jörg Fegert. Legislation could follow soon after that, either as a standalone instrument or through proposals already in the works like the Audiovisual Media Services Directive or the Digital Fairness Act, both expected in the second half of the year. Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has signaled her preference for age restrictions.

Fault lines: At recent ministerial summits, EU countries have mostly aligned with calls for bloc-wide age restrictions on social media. One country has remained reticent, Estonia. Privacy and child rights experts argue that the bans would harm everyone’s privacy and be ineffective in protecting kids, respectively.

Likely progress:

— Eliza Gkritsi

Loosening emissions rules

Why it matters: The Emissions Trading System is the EU’s most important climate policy. It forces big polluters such as steelmakers, cement manufacturers and chemicals companies to pay a fee for every ton of carbon dioxide they emit. It also caps total CO2 emissions. The idea is to force industry to find nonpolluting business models.

State of play: The European Commission will propose changes to the ETS on July 15, and is planning to modestly loosen the rules. That might include a slower reduction of the total emissions cap, more free allowances, and the use of international carbon credits to offset emissions. Will that be enough for European industry, which is already complaining of high energy prices and competition from China? Probably not.

Fault lines: This is going to be a political knife fight. Some countries — Poland, Italy, Czechia, even, briefly, Germany — have waged outright war on the ETS, calling for it to be weakened or even suspended to help boost EU industry. Lots of others are unlikely to accept that. Ireland, which has kept out of the fray, has promised to be an honest broker, and has plenty of goodwill. But given the depth of feeling on this topic, getting a deal inside the year could be tough.

Likely progress:

— James Fernyhough

Overhauling financial plumbing

Why it matters: Defense, the green transition, digital innovation: These are the kinds of priorities the EU is hoping will be financed via private sector capital if its big swing to unify its money markets to rival Wall Street pays off. The overall project is known as the Savings and Investments Union, but the key legislation on the table right now is catchily titled the Market Integration and Supervision Package, or MISP. Brussels hopes that creating a single market for investment with unified rules will get more financing sloshing around the bloc and help to grow innovative European companies.

State of play: The heads of the three EU political bodies have committed to a target of the end of 2026 for an overall political deal on MISP. But that’s highly unlikely. If governments can set aside their differences to strike a Council deal (and that’s a big if), it will likely be toward the end of the year. For the European Parliament, a political deal is likely to come at the end of the year. That puts the timeframe for an overall EU deal well into 2027 — meaning the best Dublin can do is push for the Council deal during its presidency.

Fault lines: The package is a technical beast full of changes to capital market structure and rules, but the most contentious element is on creating a single EU top cop for the biggest financial plumbing firms. Many countries don’t want to cede power to an EU watchdog, some want to preserve the strength of their national investment ecosystems, while others are impatient for progress on the project and want to push for a deal by any means necessary.

Likely progress:

— Kathryn Carlson

Strengthening trade action

Why it matters: For the first time, all EU member countries are exporting less to China than they are importing — and the bloc’s trade deficit is ballooning. “The last one which didn’t have a deficit was Germany but that has changed also now,” Economy Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis told POLITICO. “So it’s important to rebalance this economic relation and for the EU, where necessary, to defend our market.” The European Commission wants to propose new tools, like a diversification instrument, and improve the effectiveness of its existing trade defense arsenal. A Commission proposal is expected in the third quarter — and there’s no shortage of ideas already from the Brussels trade bubble.

State of play: National politicians that are hawkish on trade — like French President Emmanuel Macron or Belgian Prime Minister Bart De Wever — want stronger trade action from the Commission. The executive itself is understandably more cautious. But with the bloc’s trade defense department scrambling to address incoming complaints, reform is needed to speed things up.

Fault lines: As so often in trade policy, France and Germany are on opposing sides of the debate. However, while the coalition in Berlin might be divided on the issue, the flip from a trade surplus with China to a deficit has Chancellor Friedrich Merz worried about erosion of his country’s industrial base. France, meanwhile, launched a push for stronger trade action in a position paper that was backed by Italy, the Netherlands and Lithuania. Spain initially signed up, before publicly disavowing the document.

Likely progress:

—Koen Verhelst

Creating EU-level companies

Why it matters: European startups are losing ground to American and Chinese rivals, in part because scaling across the bloc means navigating 27 national company law systems. The 28th regime, branded “EU Inc.,” is the European Commission’s attempt to fix that with an optional EU-wide corporate form that can be registered online within 48 hours, for under €100 and with no minimum capital requirement.

State of play: EU leaders want the file, proposed in March, agreed before the end of the year. A European Parliament own-initiative report drafted ahead of the proposal won a comfortable endorsement in January, auguring a clear path. Lead lawmaker René Repasi’s draft report is due at the end of June, with a committee vote in September.

Fault lines: The Commission built EU Inc. on an internal market legal base that needs only a qualified majority, rather than the unanimity-bound article used for every previous EU company form. To defend that, it keeps handing the hardest questions — worker participation and tax — back to national law, and has dropped contentious features like a dedicated EU Inc. court.

Organized labor meanwhile sees the optional form as a license to shop for the lightest rules and the European Trade Union Confederation has called for the file to be halted until worker safeguards are written in. Mobilization has spread from the Nordics and Austria, but nowhere is it louder than Germany, where there are fears that employee board representation at the heart of its co-determination model could be lost.

Likely progress:

— Jacob Parry

Limiting automotive emissions

Why it matters: After months of political pressure and lobbying, the European Commission put forward an automotive package in December 2025 that does away with its 2035 de facto combustion engine ban in favor of a target to reduce tailpipe emissions by 90 percent. It allows automakers to sell all power trains past 2035 so long as they make investments in green steel and alternative fuels. Separately, the package sets targets for EU countries to electrify corporate fleets — company vehicles that make up 60 percent of car sales across the EU. The Commission’s hope is that corporate fleet decarbonization will make up for the extra CO2 emissions coming from automakers.

State of play: The European People’s Party is the lead negotiator in the European Parliament and submitted a proposal that goes far beyond the Commission’s suggestion: a 73 percent reduction in tailpipe emissions, including various emission offsets for green steel and alternative fuels. The corporate fleets proposal, meanwhile, appears to be dead on arrival in the Council of the EU where it faces staunch pushback from Germany and a coalition of countries led by Poland that opposes binding targets for member countries. Together, the group poses a blocking minority.

Fault lines: The biggest question is whether the EPP will hold its center majority together with the Socialists and Democrats and Renew or partner with the far right to push through its desired outcome. The EPP campaigned on overturning the combustion engine ban — a goal similarly held by the far right. Looming over both files is the Industrial Accelerator Act, which will set the definition of what counts as made in the EU, a provision woven into both regulations.

Likely progress:

—Jordyn Dahl

Championing innovative medicines

Why it matters: The Biotech Act (part one) is an attempt to boost the EU’s biotechnology sector in health care — think rare disease cell therapies, vaccines and targeted cancer drugs. Europe has traditionally been among the world’s leaders in biotech but that position is slipping, with the U.S. and China pulling further ahead.

State of play: Cyprus didn’t get very far with negotiations on the European Commission proposal, with translations only arriving toward the end of its presidency and health ministers discussing the text at a meeting in Luxembourg on June 16. The European Parliament is making quicker progress, with the health and industry committees expected to publish their draft reports this month. MEPs have commissioned the Parliament’s in-house researchers to study the impact of the legislation, since the Commission omitted to publish an impact assessment.

Fault lines: Key to the proposal is a patent extension for EU-made drugs, a perk to attract pharma investment. However, Ireland’s presidency lands in the midst of a transatlantic rift over drug pricing, with the U.S. demanding that financially stretched EU countries pay more for novel drugs. A patent extension would only squeeze the already tight coffers further. Ireland will have to balance larger, pharma-heavy countries’ demands to protect industry with smaller countries’ push to limit monopoly rights and expand medicines access — all while pressure from the U.S. and industry hangs over its head.

Likely progress:

— Rory O’Neill

Rethinking environmental rules

Why it matters: The European Commission’s environmental omnibus proposes sweeping changes to laws on emissions reporting, circular economy, geospatial data collection and environmental assessments. The proposal has become emblematic of growing tension between Europe’s environmental objectives and its push to revive industry.

State of play: The file is divided into three chunks on permitting procedure, emissions reporting and extended producer responsibility schemes, which force companies to pay to deal with their products when they’re thrown out. EU country delegations have a partial agreement on the file but still disagree on the more political aspects. They are under pressure from leaders to finish all simplification packages by the end of the year. But in the Parliament, the file is handled by numerous MEPs and committees, which slows down the process.

Fault lines: EU countries agree with the idea of speeding up environmental permitting procedures, but some are pushing for more EU laws to be reopened — including the bloc’s sensitive birds and habitats rules — to make it happen. That’s angering environmental groups. Some EU members want to retain more control over how they handle their own permitting procedures. EU governments and MEPs disagree with the Commission on how to simplify EPR schemes. Negotiations have stalled on this point as the co-legislators want to wait for an upcoming law on circular economy to decide the best course of action.

Likely progress:

— Marianne Gros

Securing critical infrastructure

Why it matters: The European Union has spent years trying to persuade national governments to kick Chinese tech giant Huawei out of telecom networks over concerns about snooping and data theft. Now, the European Commission has lost patience and wants to force countries to kick out risky vendors — and not just in telecoms. The revamped Cybersecurity Act allows the EU to identify the most important tech used by critical industries, say which countries pose a cybersecurity concern and dictate which suppliers should be banned. It also gives more money and power to EU cyber agency ENISA and overhauls the EU’s much-maligned system of cyber certification.

State of play: The Commission published its proposal in January and national capitals recently had a first stab at a response, but haven’t yet drafted their own version of the hotly contested text on supply chain issues. Ireland hopes to reach a common position by the end of the year. The European Parliament is aiming for a first proposal by the fall, with a view to hashing out amendments by October and a final vote in the Parliament next spring.

Fault lines: Even before the law was proposed, EU capitals voiced discomfort about what they saw as a possible Brussels power grab. Many governments see decisions about which suppliers to include in their critical supply chains as a national security issue, which the EU isn’t allowed to interfere with. There are also concerns about upsetting China, and the cost of ripping and replacing expensive equipment from massive and complex supply chains. National cyber agencies also want to make sure ENISA doesn’t encroach on their patches.

Likely progress:

— Sam Clark

Rolling out migration rules

Why it matters: After years of bickering, the EU approved a major overhaul of its migration policy in a bid to gain greater control over who crosses into the bloc and send more support to countries that receive the most migrants. The reforms have to help regain people’s trust that EU countries and Brussels are in control of migration at a time when anti-migration parties are riding high in the polls.

State of play: The Pact on Migration and Asylum started applying on June 12 but implementing the massive package of reforms and fixing gaps as they arise will remain high on the agenda. The Irish presidency will also oversee the negotiation of new mandates for Frontex, Europol and Eurojust and even though it won’t be up to Brussels to set up deportation hubs outside EU borders, Ireland’s time at the helm of the Council could nonetheless be marked by countries’ preparations to do so.

Fault lines: Migration policy in the EU has been marked by finger-pointing and not-so-temporary national border controls. Brussels’ overhaul relies on greater trust in frontline countries’ handling of arriving migrants and — in return — greater support for them. But attempts to reboot solidarity remain fragile.

Likely progress:

— Hanne Cokelaere

Opening up defense contracts

Why it matters: Russia’s war in Ukraine and doubts about U.S. support under President Donald Trump are spurring a push to build a thriving domestic defense industry in Europe. But hampering progress is the fact that many countries currently use an exemption in the EU treaties allowing them to favor their home defense industries in arms contracts, meaning there’s no bloc-wide single market for defense. The European Commission tried to discourage the use of this exemption under the original 2009 defense procurement directive — with little success. A review of the directive aims to tackle this again.

State of play: The review is expected to land in the fall, as it’ll only be published after a broader communication on the single market, due next month. That timetable means Ireland has scaled down its ambition. A draft Irish policy program from May, seen by POLITICO, said the presidency would “progress the revision of the Defence Procurement Directive,” while in June the Irish presidency published a document saying that “will advance work” on defense procurement.

Fault lines: Big countries with big industries like France, Germany and Italy don’t have much appetite to open up their defense contracts to non-national companies. And analysts recognize that in some cases, they have a point. If France were to open a public tender for the acquisition of nuclear submarines, for example, “its nuclear weapons programme would effectively be publicly exposed” wrote Daniel Fiott, a highly respected defense analyst. Defense Commissioner Andrius Kubilius has so far spoken about “incentives” to persuade EU countries to avoid using the treaty exemption.

Likely progress:

— Jacopo Barigazzi

Expanding the EU

Why it matters: The EU hasn’t had a new member join in 13 years, but since the outbreak of the war in Ukraine, enlargement has been imbued with a new urgency. While the bloc’s main drawcard was once its economic and trade power, countries are now also banging on the door for security and defense reasons, with Montenegro, Ukraine, Albania, Moldova and potentially even Iceland all pushing to move their candidacies forward.

State of play: Montenegro is leading the pack, with 16 of its 33 negotiating chapters closed and an ambitious aim to become the 28th member of the EU by 2028. That’s a tall order given it would need to close the rest of its chapters this year to give EU countries enough time to approve its membership. Work began under Cyprus’ presidency to draft its accession treaty, an important milestone which Ireland will aim to finish. Ukraine, meanwhile, which hopes to join the EU as part of an eventual peace deal with Russia, has yet to close a single chapter, after years of Hungarian resistance under former Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. Iceland is heading to a referendum in August to decide whether to reopen talks to join the EU.

Fault lines: After years of stonewalling by Orbán, many EU countries are reluctant to add new members without reforming the way the bloc makes decisions. With France heading to an election in 2027, Paris is reluctant to make enlargement an issue on which the far right could win votes. And while tiny Montenegro could easily be absorbed by the bloc, other countries have concerns about how Ukraine’s massive agricultural sector could upset Europe’s domestic markets and drain the bloc’s support funds for farmers. One possibility could be drafting different rules for new members, including initially suspending their voting rights.

Likely progress:

— Sebastian Starcevic

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The bill’s main provision, a Made in Europe preference, would favor locally made goods. Its supporters say it’s high time for the EU to defend its industry, but others want to hit the brakes on what they see as a protectionist measure.

Critics find the proposal risks turning into a legal maze for companies and driving up prices for EU-made products, while potentially shutting out friendly trading partners such as Canada, the U.K. or Japan.

“What is happening at Volkswagen is alarming, but it is not an isolated case. It is the consequence of years of European naivety while our global competitors pursued clear and aggressive industrial strategies,” said French liberal lawmaker Christophe Grudler, one of the three leaders on the file in the European Parliament.

Negotiations involving EU countries and lawmakers are only now getting underway after the European Commission presented its proposal with a three-month delay in March. Officials privately acknowledge that time is already running short to secure a compromise by the end of the year, as prescribed by the EU’s One Europe, One Market roadmap.

Who’s to be trusted

The toughest challenge ahead is agreeing on which countries should be included on a list of “trusted partners,” whose products will be likened to European ones in some areas of public procurement and funding.

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“We will need some time to analyse the specific details of the announcement with respect to different product categories,” said Rajesh Nair, chief executive officer of Tata Steel UK, pointing out the new quotas mark a 60 percent cut to products the U.K.’s largest steelmaker exports to the EU under guaranteed tariff-free quotas.

“Given the importance of the EU market to British steel producers, fair and workable market access remains critical if we are to achieve a sustainable steel industry here in the UK,” Nair said.

The pools are, however, likely to be quickly filled by countries with larger production, according to UK Steel.

“There is further work to be done by the Government as U.K.-EU reset talks continue,” said UK Steel’s Director-General, Gareth Stace.

“Securing wider export access for certain high-value steel products will be critical for the long-term viability and profitability of the U.K. steel sector,” Stace said. “The U.K. and EU are interdependent markets, and we hope both sides will take a reasonable view of each other’s needs as discussions take place over the coming months.”

This article has been updated.

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